interviews
Water and the American West
by Richard Frank
October 25, 2021
This interview with Richard Frank, professor of environmental practice at the UC Davis School of Law and Director of the California Environmental Law and Policy Center, was conducted and condensed by franknews.
frank | Can you tell me a little bit about the story of water and how it's tied to the West, and to California in particular?
Richard | A friend of mine who's a Court of Appeals Justice here in California wrote an opinion on a water law dispute and started it with the quote, "the history of California is written on its waters." And I think that the point is true of the entire American West.
Water policy and legal issues are inextricably tied to the development of the Western United States; water is the limiting factor in so many ways to settlement, to economic development, to prosperity, and to the environment and environmental preservation.
Can you talk about the difference between groundwater and surface water– and the policies that regulate each?
There are really two types of water when it comes to human consumption. There's surface water: that is the water that is transmitted by lakes, rivers, and streams. Then there is groundwater, and a substantial amount of water that Americans and the American West rely on is groundwater. That is water that is stored in groundwater aquifers, which are naturally occurring groundwater basins. Both groundwater and surface water are critical to the American West and its economy and its culture.
Traditionally a couple of things are important to note, first of all, water is finite. Second, water gets allocated in the Western United States generally at the state level. There's a limited federal role. Primarily, policy decisions about who gets how much water for what purpose are made state by state.
I think allocation is really interesting in that it's more state-level than federal. How was water and the allocation of water in California designed? Is it a public-private combination? What goes on in terms of the infrastructure of water?
Another very good question. The answer is it depends. Most of our water infrastructure is public in nature.
Again, in the American West, the regulation of water rights is generally done at the state level, but the federal government, historically, has a major water footprint in the American West because it has been federal dollars and federal design and management that really controlled much of the major water infrastructure in the American West — you know, Hoover Dam, and the complex system of dams and reservoirs on the Colorado River in California, with the Central Valley Project that was built and managed by the federal government with Shasta Dam on the upper Sacramento River as the centerpiece of that project. But we also have a California State Water Project, the key facility being the Oroville Dam and reservoir on the Southern River that is managed by state water managers. If we were starting over, that kind of parallel system would make no particular engineering or operational sense.
But, we are captive to our history.
And then you have these massive systems of aqueducts and canals that move water from one place to another throughout the American West. They are particularly responsible for moving water from surface water storage facilities to population centers. In the last 50 to 75 years, these population centers have really expanded dramatically, so you need massive infrastructure to deliver water from those storage facilities, the dams, and reservoirs, which generally are located in remote areas to the population centers. So it takes a lot of time and energy to transport the water, from where it is captured and stored to where it is needed for human use.
California has faced continuous drought – what measures is the state taking now to manage water?
Just to frame the issue a little bit — we have, as I mentioned, a growing population in the American Southwest at a time when the amount of available water is shrinking due to drought and due to the impacts of climate change. We have growing human demand for residential and commercial purposes and at the same time, we have a shrinking water supply. That is a huge looming crisis.
And it is beginning to play out in real-time. You see that playing out in real-time. For example, several different states and Mexico rely on Colorado River flows based on an allocation system that was created in the 1920s, which is overly optimistic about the amount of available water. From the 1920s until now, that water supply has decreased, and decreased, and decreased. Now you have interstate agreements, and in the case of Mexico, international agreements that allocate the finite Colorado river water supplies based on faulty, now obsolete, information. It is a real problem.
What measures do you take now, knowing this information?
If you look at the US Drought Monitor, it is obvious the problem is not limited to the Colorado River. We are in a mega-drought, so cutbacks are being imposed by federal and state water agencies to encourage agricultural, urban, and commercial water users to cut their water use and, and stretch finite supplies as much as possible through conservation efforts.
In California, we have the State Water Resources Control Board, the state water regulator in California, and they have issued curtailment orders. Meaning, they have told water rights holders, many of whom have had those water rights for over a hundred years, that, for the first time, the water that they feel they are entitled to, is not available. Local water districts are also issuing water conservation mandates; the San Francisco water department is doing that, in Los Angeles, the metropolitan water district, is urging urban users to curtail their efforts.
And then agriculture. Agricultural users — farmers and ranchers — have had to get water rights in many cases through the federal government, as the federal government is the operator of these water projects. They have contracts with water users, individual farmers, ranchers, or districts, and they are now issuing curtailment orders. They're saying, we know you contracted for X amount of water for this calendar year, but we are telling you because of the drought shortages we don't have that water to supply. Our reservoirs are low at Lake Shasta or at the Oroville Dam.
When you drive from San Francisco to LA on the five, you see a lot of signage from the agricultural farming community about water. There's apparently some frustration about this. What are the other options for them?
About 80% of all human consumed water goes to agriculture. That is by far the biggest component of water use, as opposed to 20% used for urban and commercial, and industrial purposes.
Over the years, ranchers and farmers, and agricultural water districts assumed that the water would always be there — as we all do.
And the farmers and ranchers have, in hindsight, exacerbated the problem by bringing more and more land into production. You see on those drives between San Francisco and Los Angeles, particularly in the San Joaquin Valley, all these orchards are being planted. Orchards are more lucrative crops than row crops — cotton, alfalfa, and rice. But, if you are growing a row crop, you can leave the land fallow in times of drought.
We don't have to plant. If the water stopped there, or if it's too expensive to get, it may make economic sense, but if you have an orchard or a vineyard it's a high value, those are high value crops, you don't have that operational flexibility and they need to be irrigated in wet years and in dry years. Now, you see these orchards, which were only planted a few years ago, are now being uprooted because the farmers realized that they don't have the water necessary to keep those vineyards and orchards alive. For ranchers, the same thing is true with their herds. They don’t have enough water for their livestock.
The water shortage has never been drier than it is right now. Farmers and ranchers are being deprived of water that they traditionally believed was theirs and they're very understandably, very unhappy about it. They see it as a threat to their livelihood and to the livelihood of the folks who work for them. Their anger and frustration are to be expected, but it's nobody's fault.
To say, as some farmers do, that it is mismanagement by state and federal government officials, I think is overly simplistic and misplaced in the face of a mega-drought. Everybody's going to have to sacrifice. Everybody's going to have to be more efficient in how they use water. All sectors are going to need to be more efficient with the water that does exist.
Looking at this percentage breakdown of water use – is it actually important for individual users to change their water habits?
Well, every little bit helps. When you're talking about homeowners, about 70% of urban water use is for outdoor irrigation. So we're talking parks and cemeteries and golf courses and folks' yards. You know, that used to be considered part of that American dream and the California dream — you would have a big lawn in front of your house and behind your house. Truth be told, that has never made much sense in an arid environment. That's where the water savings in urban areas is critical in the way it really involves aesthetics rather than critical human needs, like water for drinking and bathing and sanitation purposes. There is a growing movement away from big lawns, and away from the type of landscaping that you see in the Eastern US — there is no drought in the Eastern United States. As Hurricane Ida and other recent storms have shown, the problem is too much water, or rather than too little in most of the Eastern United States. So it really is a tale of two countries.
We just need to recognize that the American West is an arid region. It has always been an arid region, we can't make the desert bloom with water that doesn't exist. We need to be more efficient in how we allocate those water supplies. And it seems to me in an urban area, the best way to conserve and most effective way is to reduce urban landscaping, which is the major component of urban water use.
You also write about water markets and making them better – for those who don’t know, what is the water market?
Water markets, that is, the voluntary transfer of water between water users, is more robust in some other Western states. Again Arizona and New Mexico come to mind. California somewhat surprisingly is behind the curve. We are in the dark ages compared to other states. Water markets are kind of anecdotal. There is not much of a statewide system. It is done at the local level, through individual transactions without much oversight and without much transparency. And I have concerns about all of those things.
I believe conceptually watermarks are a way to stretch scarce, finite water resources to make water use more efficient. I can, for example, allow farmers or ranchers to sell water to urban uses or commercial usage or factories in times of drought.
Farmers sometimes can make more money by farming water, than they can by farming crops.
There are efficiencies to be gained here.
The problem in my view is really one of transparency. The water markets are not publicly regulated, and some of the people who are engaging in water transactions like it that way, frankly, they want to operate under the radar.
In my opinion, water markets need to be overseen by a public entity rather than private or nonprofit entities. We need oversight and transparency, so that folks like you and myself can follow the markets to see who's selling water to whom, for what purpose, and make sure that those water transfers serve the public interests and not just the private interests.
There have been a number of stories in the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal and the Salt Lake City Tribune about efforts in some parts to privatize water transfer. Hedge fund managers are buying and selling water, as a means of profiting. And it strikes me that when you're talking about an essential public resource — and in California, it is embedded in the law that public water is an inherently public resource, that water is owned by the public and it can be used for private purposes, but it is an inherently public resource — the idea of commoditizing water through the private, opaque markets is very troublesome to me. I think it represents a very dangerous trend and one that needs to be corrected and avoided.
Why is California so behind?
There's no good reason for it. It's largely inexplicable that since the state was created on September 9th, 1860, we've been fighting over water. In the 19th century, it was miners versus farmers ranchers. In the 20th century, with the growth of urban communities, the evolution of California into one of the most populous states with 40 million Californians, it has been a struggle between urban and agricultural uses of water.
In the second half of the 20th century, there was a recognition that some component of water had to be left in streams to protect ecosystems, landscape, and wildlife, including the threatened and endangered wildlife. That suggestion has made agricultural users in California angry. You will see those signs that allude to the idea that food and farming are more important than environmental values. I don't happen to believe that's true. I believe both are critically important to our society. But the advocates for the environment have a proverbial seat at the water table. So that's another demand for water allocation that exists.
Do you maintain optimism?
Yes. I think it's human nature to look on the bright side. I try to do that through research scholarships and teaching. There are models for how we can do this better in the United States. Israel and Saudi Arabia and Singapore are far more efficient with their water policies and efforts. Australia went through a severe megadrought. They came out of it a few years ago, but they used that opportunity to dramatically reform their water allocation systems. That's an additional model. I think most people would agree in hindsight that their previous system was antiquated, and not able to meet the challenges of climate change and the growing water shortage in some parts of the world.
Here in the United States, we can learn from those efforts. There are also some ways to expand the water supply. Desalination for one. Again, Singapore and Saudi Arabia have led the world in terms of removing the salt content from ocean water and increasing water supply that way. In Carlsbad, California, north of San Diego, we have the biggest desalination plant in the United States right now, and that is currently satisfying a significant component of the San Diego metropolitan areas’ water needs. It's more expensive than other water supplies, but the technology is getting more refined, so the cost of desalinated water is coming down at a time when other water supplies, due to shortages and the workings of the free market are going up.
At some point, they're going to meet or get closer. Unlike some of my environmental colleagues, I think desalination is an important part of the equation.
In a proposal that came up in the recall election, one of the candidates was talking about how we just need to build a canal from the Mississippi River to California to take care of all our problems. That ignores political problems associated with that effort, as well as the massive infrastructure costs that would be required to build and maintain a major aqueduct for 2000 miles from the Mississippi to California. That's just not going to happen. Some of those pie in the sky thoughts of how we expand the water supply, I think, are unrealistic.
interviews
Robert Neer: U.S. Military History
by Robert Neer
April 24, 2018
This interview with Robert Neer, a professor and scholar of U.S. Military History, was conducted and condensed by Tatti Ribeiro for frank news. This is part 1 of an ongoing conversation.
1.
My name's Bob Neer. I'm a lecturer at Columbia University and teach a class there called Empire of Liberty: A Global History of The U.S. Military, which I've been teaching for the last several years. So I have a little bit of a perspective on how history of the U.S. military has been taught. Naturally when I first started teaching my course I started looking around at other universities to find a syllabus that I could copy, because that's the easiest way to get started teaching a course. And I was absolutely stunned to discover that at the top American universities, the most selective ones, had almost no courses focused on the U.S. military. There were military history courses about, for example, the campaigns of Alexander, or the way that the German army was successful at the beginning of World War II. Things like that. But if you wanted to understand the U.S. Army as an institution in the context of the history of the United States, at those schools, it was very, very difficult to find out much about that part of our past. There are places where one can learn that history, West Point for example, the service academies, and some state institutions that are centers of excellence for the Study of Military History. Ohio State University for example. But at the institution I was teaching at, Columbia, and other similar elite universities there was very little. Which I found really quite striking because historically American universities have taught a lot of military history, and it's been a very popular subject for people to learn about. So I've talked to people and tried to understand why that might be.
It would seem that one aspect of that change is that there's been a broad shift in the role that universities play. In the past in this country, they would educate a kind of social elite in many respects, and that was often very closely related to the officer corps.
I'm talking about 200 years ago, or 150 years ago, a considerable period of time ago. So a smaller fraction of the overall population went to college and the officer corps, as in Europe, was a place where people from socially elite families could often find a socially elite position.
Those classes were very focused on the actual practicalities of military history. Why Napoleon lost the battle of Waterloo, or how it could be that Britain ruled the seas. Not so much the way that history is taught today as a broad inquiry into the past, and the forces that shaped the present. So one thesis was that the role of American universities has changed ,and therefore the subjects that they teach have changed, and therefore, especially at these elite schools, there wasn't such a demand for that kind of practical military history.
Another thesis was that in the wake of the Vietnam War, American academia in general had turned away from the military. So historically, in this country, there's been quite close connections between institutions of higher education in the military, and certainly that continues today. The tremendous protests that convulsed these institutions of higher education, especially the most elite institutions, were dramatically affected by these protests. The reaction has been in many cases to turn away from the military.
And finally I guess you could say that although in many respects American universities are meritocratic and have generous financial aid policies often in practice, they generally serve the people who already have money and resources.
Most people who have to have a job, and find that to be a job that is relatively remunerative and attractive financially, end up joining the armed services.
I think it's a very important aspect of our past because studying the past is really kind of a way of studying the present. For example, the United States each year spends more money on its military than of all of its institutions of postsecondary education. So all the colleges, all the business schools, all law schools, all the Ph.D. programs, all the community colleges, everything after high school combined — is less than the spending on the military. So that's kind of a lot of money, and an important sort of statement of the country's social priorities. And it's beneficial to learn where it came from as a way of understanding the present.
2.
Let's talk a little bit about how it might be useful or valuable to study the history of the U.S. military. As I mentioned before, history is really just a way of talking about the present.
And if you go and look at the history shelves in a bookstore or on Amazon, I think you'll see that the vast majority of history books that are sold have been written in the last 10 to 20, years as opposed to 100 years ago. Even though the past hasn't changed. So in that sense, it can really illuminate the present.
We're right now in these very long conflicts in Afghanistan and greater Iraq, let's call it against Daesh. It's useful to consider whether that's unusual in our past, or consistent with earlier precedents in the United States. It's popular in many respects to call this current conflict a new type of war, or a forever war, or a conflict which is unprecedented. And it is unprecedented in certain respects. I would say for example, in its global reach, in the thesis that we can use military force almost anywhere in the world without having a specific declaration of war against that particular country, which was characteristic of U.S. military engagements earlier in our past in many respects.
But in fact, the history of the United States, and part of the United States is success I would say, is because of its exceptional ability in warfare, and in the exceptional achievements of its armed forces - dating back to the inception of the country. So if one considers the conflicts with the Native Americans to be a kind of generalized Indian war, as it's sometimes described, then that might really seem to be like a much longer conflict than even the current war in Afghanistan.
And if you look at American history, one characteristic presentation of it, the one that I was taught in high school, was that the United States was essentially a peaceful country that was forced into certain wars at limited times in its past because of perhaps misunderstandings, or the bad behavior of others.
For the early part of the country's history, as I mentioned, there were constant conflicts with Native Americans in different locations, as well as more precisely defined wars with European powers, for example the Revolution, the War of 1812, the Spanish American War. So in that sense it helps to appreciate the current conflict, perhaps not so unusual, and that in turn for people who want to modify it in various ways, arms them you might say. If you think that this pattern is objectionable, you need to be aware that it is perhaps characteristic of the country and people will react accordingly if you try to modify it. If you think that it should be encouraged, you have great resources to draw on ,where you say that one reason the country is the way it is now is because of this past practice.
That's just one example of how studying the broad scope of the history of the military in the United States helps to understand contemporary events at a level of detail and context which is extremely empowering, but which you really can't get if you're not familiar with the fact that there were dozens of wars against Native Americans, that the first time that U.S. troops were ordered abroad was by Thomas Jefferson against the Barbary pirates, that was a war fought in North Africa. I mean maybe many Marines know that because of the song, but most people who live in this society don't know that.
It's also worth considering the extraordinary power of the military in this society right now. If you look at how we spend our money, which in any family, or for any individual, is is a strong statement of what's important to them. We spend more money each year on our military than on all postsecondary education combined. Maybe by necessity, maybe because it leads to our success. Maybe it's a good thing or a bad thing, but to put it in the context of the relative importance of these different fields, suggest to me that everybody in the United States should be familiar with this history, as much as they're familiar with works of literature, or the basic principles of physics, and mathematics, or all the other things our students are taught, because it's such a critical part of our contemporary existence. To shut yourself off from that leaves you almost blind to that important area.